Gujarat is not a scalable Model for Modi’s Prime Ministerial Ambitions

Gujarat is not a scalable Model for Modi’s Prime Ministerial Ambitions

The Gujarat electorate has thrown up a conundrum for India that raises deep philosophical questions about the future of its polity. Firstly, electoral compulsions have once again prevailed over the rule of law. The difference between brute mobocracy and a fair democracy is the rule of law. Secondly, Gujarat has again tacitly approved a rather contemptuous message to its minorities that says you are irrelevant. This has implications for national politics. For these reasons alone Gujarat’s political choices need careful scrutiny.

It may be useful to recall BJP’s general electoral strategy of polarization along the communal fault line to generate a larger share of votes for it. I am by no means implying Congress strategy of polarization along caste lines is less harmful to BJP’s polarization along communal lines. Both are terribly debilitating for India. My effort here is more geared to showing why Gujarat cannot be scaled up to India.

For the purposes of a crude but simple model that helps explain the strategy of polarization, consider the total electorate to be made up of 4 blocks. These are Upper Casts [UC], Middle Castes [MC], Lower Casts [LC] and Muslims [M]. The size of these blocks varies from State to State, district to district, town to town. Furthermore, there is significant difference in size and composition between urban and rural areas. Muslims in particular cluster around town & cities and shun rural areas unless they happen to have a significant majority by themselves. For the purposes of understanding the dynamics, assume UC is 20%, MC is 40%, LC is 20% and M is 20%. This roughly corresponds to the caste composition of the Hindus that one observes in practice.

An increase in the degree of polarization works differently on the 4 blocks. A working political assumption is that UCs tend to polarize favorably towards the BJP, LCs and Muslims against. MCs is where the real battleground lies. Note as an initial condition, a majority of UCs is aligned with the BJP, and Ms and LCs against it. So the real gain or loss from an increased degree of polarization comes from the MCs. The other groups are more or less committed in their preferences.

The above configuration, very back of the envelope, gives the BJP roughly 30% of the vote without any polarization. With maximum polarization, the vote percentage goes to about 40 to 45% range. So the real battle for the BJP is to find an emotive issue that polarizes the Middle Casts into voting along communal lines. It helps the BJP to have Middle Cast leadership at the State level to gain some extra leverage. Ever since the Ayodhya affair, BJP has pursued the same electoral strategy without any change.

In Gujarat, Muslims constitute no more than 9% of the population against a national average closer to 18-20%. Other minorities in Gujarat are insignificant at less than 1%. This changes the composition of the Gujarat’s electorate to BJP’s natural advantage. Without any polarization, BJP comes in with a 40% share of the vote compared to others [including Congress] at something close to 30%. No wonder therefore, Gujarat has traditionally been a BJP stronghold. Note issues and electorate’s mood changes from election to election. What we are taking of is general tendencies. Fact is BJP doesn’t need polarization in Gujarat to win. It needs that outside Gujarat. Therefore, Gujarat is a model to be sold to the electorate outside Gujarat – preferably in a different garb – more development rather than naked polarization.

The basic arithmetic changes drastically once you step outside Gujarat. Firstly, the Muslim vote aligned against the BJP jumps to 20%. The degree of polarization required to offset that is much higher because BJP needs to get more than 50% of the Middle Caste votes in order to win as opposed to 25% in the case of Gujarat. Moreover, extreme polarization generates a backlash in lost UC vote share. Under such circumstances, BJP is an under an compulsion to find a Middle Caste leader, well disposed to its ideology, who can pull in the additional votes necessary to put together a winning combination. As we see from history, BJP has done well in States where Middle Caste leaders lead it. Modi himself is a Middle Caste leader, which sort of seals the arithmetic in Gujarat for the BJP. The same play was evident in UP, Karnataka and the BJP alliance with Nitish Kumar in Bihar. When the MCs have their own leader of stature as Mulayam, or Nitish, BJP just cannot find the winning combination on its own no matter what the degree of polarization its ideologues drum up.

With Gujarat not being scalable to the rest of India what options does the BJP have to capture power?

If BJP is to be the main player in a winning coalition, BJP needs a degree of emotive polarization. However, that by itself is useless without an alliance with other Middle Caste leaders. That is the basic reason why we find ourselves in an era of coalition politics. BJP just cannot win on its own steam given the rival Congress strategy of polarization along caste lines. India is locked into divisive politics of one sort or the other.

If the Gujarat model is not scalable, what are Modi’s chances of leading the assault on Delhi? Nitish Kumar, and other Middle Caste leaders like him, will find Modi’s creation of a cult around himself too hard to swallow. Furthermore, aligning with Modi’s hard Hindutva will loose them the critical Muslim vote on which they depend to keep the Congress at bay. Given Congress strategy of coalition building, BJP will have to find leaders acceptable to its potential coalition partners in order to win. And Modi, with his near contemptuous disdain for minorities, together with his strenuous efforts to build a personality cult, has more or less ruled himself out of the game.

Can a softer, more balanced narrative rehabilitate Modi after his power struggle within the Sangh Pariwar is settled in his favor?

Modi faces stiff competition from a gaggle of BJP national level leaders but few of them have his electoral reach or access to corporate war chests. The later is critical in the BJP because central leaders have no separate access to resources that are needed to reward corporate generosity. Their funding comes entirely from regional satraps like Modi.

Furthermore, it is not clear that the Brahmins of Nagpur are ready to surrender their vast cultural organization to a Middle Caste leader like Modi. Note that BJP has no organizational muscle of its own. It depends more or less entirely on the cultural reach of the RSS and its cadres to pull in the voters. RSS is the political party of cadres and BJP the political party of leaders. The latter is nothing without the former. Modi has supplanted BJP/RSS cadres with his own people in Gujarat. Will the Brahmins of Nagpur risk losing their only crown jewel to a relative outsider? This is not a question to be taken lightly. Whatever be its merits or demerits, RSS remains one of the most potent political organizations in India.

Much of Modi’s obduracy towards minorities is predicated on his need to win the battle for supremacy within the Sangh Pariwar. As a shrewd politician with an eye Delhi’s throne, he would have made the appropriate noises of remorse and regret for 2002 long ere this but for the need to keep his firebrand supporters by his side. Modi needs to win over either the RSS or his rivals in Delhi to emerge as the undisputed leader within the Sangh Pariwar. Without one or the other, he cannot win. This triangular contest is what constrains Modi’s emergence as a national leader in his own right.

Modi has various other options open to him one of which is to be less aggressive and perhaps join the collegium of BJP leaders in Delhi and become a team player and bide his time. Provided he mellows down, BJP could then use him as the polarizing factor to lead the Hindutva charge for power. If Modi were to consent to play Advani to a more acceptable BJP leader as ABV, he would give BJP the chance it needs to build a winning coalition with Middle Caste leaders.

Is Modi really larger than his image? If you find Modi retaining his CM’s post in Gujarat & consenting to work for the greater good of his party, you will have your answer.